Two Little Secrets From My Boss

Chapter 156

Maya’s POV

The house sleeps around me. Each step is calculated, quiet. The third stair from the bottom creaks if you put your weight on the left side, so I hug the right rail.

The hallway tile near the office amplifies sound, so I walk along the edge where the baseboards muffle footfalls.

I've mapped this house the way a soldier maps enemy territory—every weakness cataloged, every vulnerability noted.

The office door opens silently. I've been oiling the hinges for weeks now, tiny drops of WD-40 applied during my legitimate duties, erasing the squeak that would betray this moment.

His computer sits on the desk, screen dark, keyboard still warm from afternoon use.

I settle into his chair—expensive leather that probably costs more than my entire wardrobe—and press the power button. The screen blooms to life, demanding a password.

Three attempts, that's usually all it takes before I crack it. People are predictable in their security choices. They pick meaningful dates, significant names, combinations that matter to them personally. Xander is no different.

First attempt: the twins' birthday. Denied.

Second attempt: Daphne's birthday. Denied.

Third attempt: the date he and Daphne married. The screen unlocks.

I'm in.

My hands move across the keyboard with practiced efficiency. I'm searching for financial records, wire transfers. Anything connecting Xander to Lora's death, to Gerald's operations, to the money that always leaves a trail no matter how carefully people try to hide it.

Six years of research told me what to look for. Six years of preparation mapped out exactly where the evidence should be.

I navigate through folders. Documents organized with the kind of obsessive precision I'd expect from a CEO—personal, business, legal, family.

Then I see it, a folder labeled simply: Morrison Investigation.

My hand freezes on the mouse. Morrison. Lora's maiden name. My name, before I changed it to disappear into this family's blind spot.

I click, the folder opens. What I find inside stops me cold.

A private investigation file. Not about Maya—I half expected to find evidence he's been investigating me, tracking my background, uncovering the lies I've built this identity on. But no. This is about Lora.

Years of accumulated research. Witness interviews Xander commissioned, each one professionally transcribed, dated, organized chronologically.

Financial forensics tracing Gerald's network, following money through shell corporations and offshore accounts.

Timeline reconstructions, evidence logs, communication records between Gerald and people whose names I don't recognize but whose roles in Lora's life I can guess.

Notes in Xander's own handwriting fill the margins. His script is sharp, precise, the writing of someone who thinks while his pen moves. Questions sprawl across pages:

Why didn't anyone notice the bruises? Who knew and said nothing? Where was I when she needed help?

One note, dated three years before I even arrived here, makes my breath catch:

‘Gerald destroyed her. I should have seen it, should have intervened. Should have done something before it was too late. How do I carry this? How do I live with knowing I could have stopped this?’

Regret. Raw, honest regret bleeding through the words. Guilt so profound it's carved itself into the page.

This doesn't fit. The villain of my story doesn't hire investigators to find justice for his victim.

The man I came here to destroy doesn't spend years searching for the truth about what happened to the woman his former associate destroyed.

The enemy doesn't blame himself for failing to save her.

My entire narrative is crumbling, and I'm staring at the evidence of its collapse on a computer screen at two in the morning.

I'm still frozen, still trying to process what this means, when I hear it.

A footfall in the hallway—not the measured pace of a guard on patrol. Something closer. Someone who knows exactly where they're going.

Panic floods my system, sharp and cold. I close the folders, clear the history, shut down the files with hands that suddenly won't stop shaking. The screen goes dark just as the office door opens.

I'm already moving, crossing to the door, preparing my excuse, arranging my face into the expression of someone who belongs here.

I open the door to find Archie standing there.

He's fully dressed despite the late hour—jeans, a dark t-shirt, no shoes. His eyes are sharp, alert, none of the cloudiness that comes from being woken suddenly. He's been awake. Possibly waiting, possibly watching.

"What are you doing?" His voice is quiet but carries an edge that makes my stomach drop.

The lie comes smooth, practiced, exactly what I've rehearsed for this possibility.

"I heard a noise downstairs. Came to check. I was just verifying the security system logs from Xander's computer to see if anything triggered the sensors. Better safe than sorry given the threats against the family."

Plausible, responsible, exactly the kind of thing a dedicated assistant concerned about her employers' safety would do.

Archie studies me. His eyes track my face, searching for cracks in the story, looking for the tells I've trained myself not to show. I hold steady, keep my breathing even, project competent concern rather than guilty panic.

The silence stretches, each second feels like an hour.

Then he nods—a choice, I realize with sick clarity. He's choosing to believe me despite whatever instincts are screaming otherwise. He's picking me over evidence, trust over suspicion, hope over truth.

It should feel like victory, but feels like drowning.

But he doesn't step back, doesn't move aside to let me pass. Instead he moves closer, his body nearly touching mine in the doorway, his voice dropping to something intimate and dangerous.

"We can't keep doing this, Maya." His words are soft, meant only for me. "The avoidance, the lies, pretending there's nothing between us when we both know that's bullshit. It's exhausting."

His hand rises toward my face, fingers reaching for my cheek, movement slow enough that I could stop it if I wanted to, if I had the strength.

My breath catches, betrays me. My heart hammers so loud against my ribs I'm certain he can hear it, certain it's broadcasting every feeling I'm trying to kill before it destroys everything.

For one suspended moment, I want to lean in. Want to let his hand make contact, feel his skin against mine, see what happens if I stop fighting this gravitational pull that's been dragging me toward him since the moment we met.

For one terrible, perfect moment, I want to choose him over Lora. Over revenge, over the mission I've devoted six years of my life to completing.

Instead, I pull away, step back. I put distance between us that feels like tearing something vital from my own chest.

"This is inappropriate." The words come out hollow, empty, a performance neither of us believes. "The timing, the situation... Professional boundaries exist for a reason."

I walk past him, feeling his eyes on my back the entire way to my room. Each step costs me something I can't name, each breath feels like a betrayal—of Lora, of myself, of the woman I was before Archie Hankel made me want things I have no right to want.

Behind my locked door, I press my forehead against the wood and try to remember why I came here. Try to resurrect the certainty that carried me through six years of planning.

But the investigation file burns in my memory, rewriting everything I thought I knew. Xander spent years searching for justice for Lora. Years asking questions, demanding answers, blaming himself for failing to save her.

And I came here to destroy him for it.

Lora's voice is silent tonight—no accusations, no guidance. Just emptiness where her certainty used to live.

I slide down the door until I'm sitting on the floor, knees pulled to my chest, and let myself ask the question I've been avoiding for three months.

What if I'm wrong? What if everything I believed was a lie? What if the real villain isn't the man sleeping down the hall, but the grief that convinced me revenge was the only way to honor my sister?

I don't have answers. Just doubt spreading through my certainty like rot through wood.

And Archie's eyes watching me in that hallway, choosing to believe my lies even though we both know they're lies.

Choosing me when I don't deserve to be chosen.